Li Mulan
by Peachy Hikaru
Summary: When Mulan goes into labour, her husband is away fighting for their country.


They were together all the time, even on the battlefield. Though she was a woman, Shang trusted Mulan more than anyone else. She was his lieutenant, his right-hand man.

There's only one time that they have to be apart. Mulan was pregnant, and Shang had intended on being there with her right up till the end of it. He'd told the Emperor and everything that he had no intention of coming back until Mulan was well and ready to be right there with him, and the Emperor had merely smiled and nodded. It was highly unusual, but since the pair of them had saved China before, he figured he would give them a pass.

That was before.

Before the Huns had regrouped, hell-bent on taking revenge for their slain general Shan Yu. They'd effortlessly torn through specialized regimens and blockaded the walls of the royal city, so no food could get in. The Emperor and all of the citizens trapped inside were starving to death, and unable to escape.

The only people in China thought to be able to defend China against the Huns are the people who had done so once before – Li Shang and Li (previously Fa) Mulan. But Mulan is round with child, seven months pregnant at that point.

So Shang goes alone, with the ragtag army he'd assembled the last time.

It turns out to be a clever trap to both take revenge on the soldiers who'd defeated the Huns so humiliatingly before and finish what Shan Yu had started. Shang and his army go off to fight, leaving the village where Mulan is unprotected. On the night that Mulan goes into labour, a small group of elite Hun warriors descend upon the village. They intend to raze the whole village to the ground and send Mulan's head and the body of their newborn child to General Li.

They almost succeed.

Thankfully, Mulan and Shang had planned for all contingencies and prepared a secret underground chamber below their home, where they could hide in the event of any such attacks. They gathered there with the survivors of the initial attack, and Mulan, with her mother and grandmother by her side, gave birth silently, biting down on a piece of leather to stifle the screams. In between contractions, she whispers plans to protect the group from the Huns: instructions for traps to set up; for refashioning the tools and miscellaneous items in the shelter into weapons; delivering a battle plan to the youths she had been training for years.

The survivors tried not to look or listen to the quiet gasps of agony and grunts of pain in between the whispered instructions, to give the hero of China her privacy as she struggled through the birth, her mother holding her hand and encouraging her with whispers as her grandmother wiped her sweaty forehead with a cool cloth.

When her son is born, the cries they can't stop alert the Huns to their location.

When they smash through the ceiling of the shelter, the afternoon sun shines into the pitch black of the chamber. Like a spotlight, it illuminates the spot where Mulan is sitting, quietly nursing her newborn son – just as they'd planned.

They make quick work of the Huns, who had exhausted themselves raping and pillaging, destroying whatever they could of the village as they searched for the legendary Fa Mulan.

It is Mulan who deals the final blow that no one else in the village is able to, all the men having departed with General Li. Barely able to walk, she still staggers shakily over to the leader of the battalion, a captain in the Hun army. His eyes, cold and cruel, bear a striking resemblance to someone she once knew.

"You're his son," she murmurs.

He spits defiantly at her. "You killed my father. The Great General Shan Yu."

"Yes," she says quietly, holding her sword in her hands. It's too big for her, made for a man much larger than she is. Nevertheless, she wields it with grace and poise. "And so you wanted to kill my son and I, and send proof to my husband."

He hadn't told her that. He hadn't needed to. She'd known from the moment the attack began with screams and explosions that that was their aim. There's just one thing she needs to know. "Who were you working with?"

He sneers at her. "As if I would tell you." But his eyes dart to one side, and she turns to see who he'd given that quick glance to. Her mouth hardens as she stares at the cowering matchmaker. "I see."

Then she lifts the sword, and cleanly cuts through the captain's neck with his own father's sword.

She doesn't enjoy killing, and her time in the army had not changed that, but she'd learned to deal with it, to do it where necessary. She swiftly does the same for the rest of the men, save one. For the one who looks barely more than a boy, she doesn't have the heart. Instead she gives him a grim duty: to bring back the head of his captain, to force the army to surrender.

By the time he leaves, Mulan is lightheaded and almost unconscious, yet she has to keep standing tall, showing him that she is strong, invulnerable, as he leaves on his horse.

Once his horse is out of sight, she collapses, leaning heavily on the sword. Her mother quickly runs up to her to support her, her grandmother barking orders to the survivors to find a mattress or blankets for Mulan to lie down.

"You," she almost whispers at the matchmaker. "General Li will decide what to do with you when he returns." She is placed in the small prison in the village for the time being, under careful watch by the furious villagers.

Her strength sapped by that point, it's all she can do to stagger over to the makeshift bed and go to sleep after the quiet reassurances from the rest of the survivors that everything is fine, that her students will stand guard and the women will look after her son.

* * *

The one boy who makes it back to the rest of the troops races as if the hounds of hell were nipping at his heels.

When he reaches with the news, completely opposite from what they're expecting, it completely demolishes the morale of the army. How could a pregnant woman in labour, and her ragtag bunch of women and children villagers, defeat the son of the mightiest general they had ever known? After that, it's easy for Shang's army to defeat them and rescue the Emperor and open the gates to the village, providing food and water and first aid to those still alive.

Shang wants to go home immediately to reassure himself that his wife is all right, and to meet his son, but he is still the general of the Chinese army, and has to fulfil his duties.

By the time the Emperor finally lets him go, another three months have passed. He hightails it back to his village, and when he arrives, he sees a frenzy of rebuilding.

Excited members of his community call to him, but he barely has patience to greet them, completely focused on getting back to his home, to his wife and son.

He bursts through the (new) front doors of his home, panting, to see the wondrous sight that is Mulan, kneeling as she breastfeeds their son, cooing quietly at him as she strokes his cheek with her thumb. Her mother and mother-in-law sit nearby, sipping tea. He drops his helmet by the doorway.

"Shang," she acknowledges quietly, smiling up at him as he walks over to where she's sitting and kneels next to her. "Come meet your son, Li Mi."

"After my father…" he whispers, staring down at the baby boy in awe. He takes the boy from his mother's arms, cradling him with disbelief and awe. He knew about the attempt on the village and the Huns' plans for them, and he thanked the ancestors every minute that against all odds, they had both survived. He could ask Mulan to tell him every detail about what had happened later, but for now, he had to show her how grateful he was for what she'd done.

He cleared his throat awkwardly as he passed his baby son to his mother, flushing as both older women smirked at him. They knew what was about to happen, of course, both being military wives.

"Li, shall we take Mi out for a walk?" Shang's mother asked to save the young couple some embarrassment.

"Yes, I think that the sun would be good for him," Fa Li agreed, standing up and joining the other woman.

Shang barely waited for the doors to close behind them before he pulled his wife close and kissed her roughly and passionately. "Mulan," he gasped, cradling her face in his hands. "When I heard…" he couldn't continue, finding that the words were too hard to articulate out loud. He buried his face in her neck instead, clutching her tight.

"Shang…" Mulan wrapped her arms around him, stroking her fingers through his hair. She knew his terror without him having to explain, for it was the same thing she had gone through every day and night that he'd been away from her.

He surges up, kissing her deeply with an urgency she reciprocates, both of them shredding each other's clothes off in their haste. Shang has a far easier time than Mulan – she's wearing only an old gown that cinches at the waist, half undone anyway since she was nursing their son earlier. All he has to do is slide his hands along her shoulders and down her arms, and she's naked as the day she was born.

Mulan, on the other hand, struggles mightily with Shang's armour. The metal pieces mold to Shang's body and aren't made to come off easily – it usually takes Shang at least fifteen minutes to get in and out of it.

After waiting as Mulan divests him of his shoulder pads, dropping them carelessly on the floor next to them, Shang loses patience. He pulls Mulan's hands off his chest plate and pushes her down onto the ground, holding her wrists above her head with one hand while he undoes his trousers with the other.

He bites his lip with a low moan as he sinks into her, finally. It's been five months since he saw his wife, and he can't remember the last time they'd had sex, given how pregnant she was when he left. "I love you, I love you…" he groans breathlessly as he bottoms out.

Mulan wraps her arms around him as she pulls him down for a kiss. "I love you too," she gasps into his mouth, curling her leg around his waist as he drives into her hard. Patience and gentleness are beyond him at the moment; this is a relentless race to the finish, a glorious, primal celebration of life and love.

He groans and shudders as he finishes, collapsing onto her, Mulan following a second later. He rolls onto his side a moment later, realizing that he must be squashing her into the hard ground, his arms still tight around her.

Mulan yawns and snuggles into him contentedly, frowning when she realizes that he's still wearing most of his armour and it's very uncomfortable. "Off," she demands petulantly, giving a halfhearted tug to his chest plate. He chuckles and sits up to pull the armour off, the task easier now that their hands aren't clumsy with desire. When he finally removes it he lays back down next to her, hugging her close to him.

She rests her head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat. "I missed you," she says, the simple phrase conveying everything she needs to say.

Shang takes her hand in his, brings it up to his mouth and brushes a kiss onto the back of her hand. "I missed you too."

There's still a lot of work to be done: the traitor has to be dealt with, the village has to be rebuilt, and perhaps a more immediate concern, their mothers will be returning with their son soon. But that's for later.

For now, Shang has to make sure his wife knows how much he loves and appreciates her.

* * *

 _I don't even know, okay. It's a little dark, but tbf Mulan is a war movie and she did basically massacre an army by causing an avalanche. So._

 _Please let me know what you think, as always._


End file.
